WomenCinemakers vol V WomenCinemakers vol V | Page 56

not concentrated ideas and my time
and time whole film crew. Its very
important for true filmmaker to know
what he really want to express and
WHY.
Eastern
European Directors
address questions of cultural
identity in a way Americans and
Western Europeans rarely do. What
attracted you to this topic and how
did you come up with the idea for
Ujo Viktor?
Viktoria:
Why Eastern European
Directors address questions of
cultural identity in a way Americans
and Western Europeans rarely do?
Its is really difficult question and I just
can try to answer it from my point of
view. Maybe because of different
pressures and also specific roots and
influences of our society. And also
because of physical location of our
countries too. Slovakia and Czech
republic are situated in the heart of
Europe, in between "west" and "east".
Our nations are very small and bigger
nations during whole history were
trying to occupy us and force us their
cultural and political influence. There
were many many forbidden topics in
art as well as later in film for a long
time... But strong filmmakers were
not afraid to speak and to open up
these hidden topics.. My idea of Ujo
Viktor was very much natural as it is
a story from history of my
multicultural family.. The whole film
story is actually based on true events
and the pain, passion and fear of
characters are also real.
Ujo Viktor uses an energetic
narrative structure. How did you
collaborate with Marek Grajciar?
Viktoria: Marek Grajciar is a very
talented writer and scripwriter, who
was able to rewrite story of Ujo Viktor
based on real incidents of my real
Uncle Viktor and other family into a
beautiful and exciting film script. He
did it in very sensitive, smart and
creative way, as he was able to keep
professional distance from the
characters. I really appreciated our
cooperation very much and recently
we are preparing new film story,
called Eternal memory. The story
about dark sins in family and
forgiveness is again based on real
incidents but creatively transformed
into a catching film story.